The Moral Dilemmas of Tobacco Producers in Nayarit, Mexico
Keywords:
tobacco, Mexico, contradictions, moral reasoningAbstract
This article explores how tobacco producers on the Mexican coast of Nayarit cope with moral ambiguity as part of their everyday lives. Tobacco producers continue to plant tobacco even whilst claiming that they do not make a profit from it and that the work required in its cultivation is demanding. It has been 16 years since I first heard this statement and subsequent fieldwork in the region has revealed that it is a recurrent assertion worthy of detailed analysis. The situation facing tobacco producers can be analysed from three different positions, each of which carries its own dilemmas. When considered from an economic point of view, producers claim that they essentially “work for free” or are even left out-of-pocket as a result of growing tobacco, even though they are also offered credit and a guaranteed buyer for their tobacco leaves by tobacco companies. When tobacco production is viewed as the transmission of knowledge from father to son, this aim is often contradicted by the producers themselves who argue that such knowledge is difficult to maintain due to companies’ demands for a uniform and highquality product. When perceived from a social point of view, producers claim that they stay in the tobacco business as a way of ensuring the welfare of their families (many of whom have health and life insurance) although this is at the cost of their health and liberty. As will be explored in the article, tobacco producers themselves reason these
positions through a series of commonplace contradictions.
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